HunterDavis.com » Zipit Hacking

New Ubuntu Z2 Userland from Mozzwald

hunter — Sat, 22 May 2010 15:36:44 +0000

A pingback from Geordy Rostad alerted me to a new Z2 Ubuntu userland from mozzwald. Looks like a very solid first release, and gcc compilation support is back in (apparently its not been working since my or aliosa27's bitbaked userlands??). Head over to mozzwald.com for the download and instructions and be sure to leave him some positive feedback. Those familiar with the previous Debian based userlands should feel right at home. Happy hacking!

Roll your own Google Cloud Print, Today, Using Your Zipit Z2 (or anything that can run python), in 5 Minutes

hunter — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 06:04:44 +0000

When I read about Google's new strategy for cloud printing, I thought "hey that's great!, wish I could use it before 2011!". Thankfully, I run linux on damn near everything. As I don't have an android (which would be a pretty ideal running platform for this...), I've used the Z2 as my "drop in" cloud print server. Doesn't seem like it'll take the manufacturing companies long to integrate this into new product lines, as it's pretty simple. Instructions and source code links below!

So here's the plan. We're going to configure our Z2 to periodically check an email address for emails with attachments. When it finds an email with an attachment, it prints the attachment and archives the email. As you can see from the photo, I place a little notecard on the Z2 which states "Email __EMAILREDACTED___ to print to this printer". If you want to print to this device "from the cloud", just email to it. Pretty simple , and the arm in the Z2 takes up a fairly low wattage overhead as a cloud monitor/print server.

First, we'll want to connect the Zipit to an existing printer. As I've got a network printer at work (fairly common situation), I'll use that as the example case. Using one of the linux (I'm going the debian (easy) route) Z2 distros that's popular, boot your Z2 up and get it connected to the net/up to a state where it can update via apt get. Then apt-get install cups for printing., and apt-get install gmail-notify to install all the relevant pre-reqs for python. That's one thing that's great about python on embedded, if you know another popular python program uses all your libraries, just install that first and you've got your prerequisites covered...or at least all the ones I can remember You can set up cups to handle various filetypes for printing, but it should come with postscript by default and that's enough for me

Next, we'll configure the Z2 to print to a network printer. This will be your "drop target". You can either use one of the gui printing configuration tools (select IP Printer from the drop-down list), or the cups command line or web tools. From the debian wiki, cups runs a web daemon locally than can be used to configure new printers. After installing cups, you can elinks http://localhost:631/ to get to an administration website. From here it's pretty trivial to print, as your apt-get should have pre-configured a lot of cups for you i.e. samba, workgroups info, etc (interactively in my case).

As this'll be an open source solution, there's no need to re-invent the wheel. Suresh Kumar wrote an imap attachment handler in python that's fairly compact, we can use that as an excellent base to write our script. It's PSF licensed, so you know it jives with our GPL sensibilities.

Now in this script it stores all attachments into their own hierarchical directory structure. You can remove this if you like, but I kind of like having a print backup, at least for a few weeks. This is the write_file() function. Wherever this is called you can add your own os.system call to print the file. For the lazy, if your printer is named "JACKBAUER" at the end of this function just add sysCommand = "lpr –P JACKBAUER –#1" + filename . This fills a string buffer named sysCommand with our command to print using the lpr function (cups standard printing function). Follow this line with os.system(sysCommand)

Now that your python script is finished, create a script to execute the attdownload.py with the proper variables (username, server, etc perhaps make it a background process with nohup etc). Make the script executable, and you're good to go. Either add it to your rc.local so it runs on startup or add it to your bash.rc so it loads on login. Congrats! You live in a world with email capable printers

Finished building my first guitar

hunter — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 23:27:01 +0000

Mark brought over his copy of Make, and it turns out this last Makezine had a great article on building cigar box guitars. It sounded like a really interesting project, so we went off to the hardware store to purchase some oak timber. Many days/hours/blood stains later, the fruits of our labor emerged, tuned and ready to play. . Lots of hack potential, and an easy fix if I break something. Bonus, tablature looks fine in links browser on the Z2, though you will have to scroll quite a lot. I'll see about getting gnome guitar working, should be interesting (mono bleh). Yet again another use case for the Z2 I wouldn't have imagined.

Great Pen Testing Zipit Distribution from Adrian Crenshaw (irongeek.com)

hunter — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 06:33:56 +0000

I've been meaning to split this off into a new post for a while now. Adrian Crenshaw (irongeek.com) built a great z2 linux distro, specifically with the intent of pen-testing. You can grab it here. It's not only a very cool distribution, (based on a modified rootnexus zipit distro), it's a very cool reminder of the great things we accomplish building off each other's work and sharing information. My only suggestion for his next release is to counter his assumption that metasploit won't be running at a useful speed on the z2.

Great New Z2 Userland from RootNexus

hunter — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 17:20:38 +0000

Although I've been spending my time on other hacking projects besides the Z2 lately, that does not mean there's nothing exciting happening in the Z2 community. Our friend SoundGuy has finished putting together his Z2 root image, and it is slick! After working out some of the kinks with help from our comments (they are practically forums now...) threads, SoundGuy posted up a link to his newest "For the Average User" userland image. Terrific work! He's really got a good eye for usability. More info after the break.

You can find more info on his page here, and downloads on his page here.

For those of you who know me, you know I don't accept donations and usually tell potential benefactors to send the money to Haiti or another developer who might need the money. Looks like RootNexus has got a paypal donate page up, and he's done some great work, so consider donating to support him and his work.

OpenMSX on the Z2 – 100% perfect

hunter — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 07:24:40 +0000

Busy busy as always, but still trying new packages as they catch my eye. Not that anyone is surprised at what the Z2 can do after seeing Full Throttle running, but for the MSX lovers out there openMSX runs at 100% speed with sound etc etc.

Just apt-get install openmsx, and run it once with a rom. Exit out, then edit the ~/.openMSX/share/settings.xml and set your scale factor to one. I found a sample config file on the net here that worked well.
That will set the output to 320x240, looks and runs great.

Z2 gaming and system update – GBA, GB/GBC, ScummVM (Sam and Max/Full Throttle Full Talkie), auto-login to Fluxbox on boot

hunter — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 00:24:27 +0000

So now that the Z2 is running debian and everything is working, it's really easy to install new programs and emulators. They are even automatically added to the fluxbox right-click mouse menu. I haven't changed or recompiled a single C file this time, this is fully "general public" ready! Here's what I've been playing with this weekend.

Before we get to the fun stuff, let's set up fluxbox to start (no more console login required)

edit a file called /etc/init.d/flux
the contents of this script should read
#!/bin/sh su root -c startx
now just: update-rc.d flux defaults
Fluxbox should now start up on boot!

VisualBoyAdvance (GBA) runs about 10% speed with gba roms, 70% speed with gb/gbc roms. I'm guessing a straight gb/gbc emulator may run 100%
Scummvm runs perfectly with sound, movies, voice, everything!! when you set scale=1x in the .scummvmrc
1. Monkey Island 2 - 100% perfect
2. Full Throttle - 100% perfect!
3. Zak McKracken - 100% perfect
4. Beneath a Steel Sky - 100% perfect
5. Flight of the Amazon Queen - 100% perfect
6. Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis - 100% perfect
7. Indiana Jones and the last Crusade - 100% perfect
8. Maniac Mansion - 100% perfect
9. Simon the Sorceror 2 - Full CD Talkie - 100% perfect
10. Sam and Max hit the road - Full CD Talkie - 100% perfect

Z2 quickie video followup – (debian) Bomberclone running (with sound, SDL ,etc) on the Z2

hunter — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 18:10:34 +0000

Just a quick followup to the debian image video.

Bomberclone is in the debian repository. It loads, but at 640x480. ~~You can change this in the source code and re-compile if you wish, however it's still (mostly) playable at 640~~ Just edit .bomberclone.cfg and change the xres to 320 and yres to 240!! Works perfect and netplay! Wormux installs but fails to fully load at 640x480 as well. Haven't looked into the source yet, probably have to replace the sdl-render options like with dosbox last year.
Note*
If you are having trouble with the mouse/keyboard in flux, download aliosa27's z2mouse-option and keymap.map files and add them to the /bin/startfluxbox script as mentioned in the comments thread for the debian image tutorial.

New Video/Tutorial – Flashing a Stock Z2 to Newest Debian Image (Windows edition)

hunter — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 05:19:00 +0000

So you've only got a windows machine handy, and you want to flash your Z2 to the newest debian (apt-get! no more cross-compiling!) image with wireless? This video is for you. Full Text after the jump.

You'll need

Either Aliosa27's 1gb or 2gb disk image posted to the SF page.
Aliosa27's latest oe userland image
phsydiskwrite (I recommend the GUI version for ease of use)
The autoflasher script
(if windows can't see the fat partition) Windows ext2 filesystem driver

Ready?

First, flash the zipit. Extract the autoflasher bundle to a fat16 formatted memory card
Open Aliosa27's wireless+x+audio.tar.gz file, and copy out the /boot/linux-2.6.29 file to your memory card
Rename this file kernel.bin
Boot the zipit with the SD card inserted. If this does not start the linux flash, go to settings->reset to default and it should soft-reset
Some SD cards are reported to not work, or not always be seen by the zipit. Try both with and without the power cable plugged in
The z2 will boot linux and copy the wifi firmware to the sd card before flashing linux to the Z2
Copy off the 2 wireless firmware files gspsi.bin and gpspsi_helper.bin to a folder, you will copy these back to the memory card after we write the image
IMPORTANT -- rename helper_gspi.bin to be gspi8686_hlp.bin or it will not load later!
Extract the 1/2gb image to a folder
Extract phsydiskwrite to a folder
Insert your microSD card into the computer (adapter, usb stick, etc)
Run phsygui.exe from within the folder you extracted psydiskwrite to (requires .net framework)
right-click on the drive letter for your SD card, select the first menu item, and then select the 1/2gb image you extracted earlier (.img)
After it writes, safely remove the disk then plug it back in. if windows can see the fat partition copy the firmware files to it
If windows cannot see this fat partition, congratulations! Windows sucks! Dowload the ext2 filesystem driver, run it, then copy the firmware files over to /lib/firmware/notlibertas/ (yes notlibertas, the fat filesystem is mounted as /lib/firmware/libertas so you can't use that)
Insert the sd card into the Z2, and boot. Login as root, password debian. Congrats! You've got debian on the zipit!
If windows couldn't see your fat32 partition, copy the firmware files from /lib/firmware/notlibertas to /lib/firmware/libertas. You may need to run fsck if linux can't see the files.
Reboot, and you should have wireless device when you type iwconfig. Configure the wireless settings, and you're ready. I like to apt-get install ssh right away, as that's what I use most of all. Ahhhhhhh! Doesn't it feel refreshing to install new software to the Z2 without cross-compiling?
Install ssh/sshd with apt-get install ssh You'll also have to force-move the real start-stop-daemon back in place with mv /sbin/start-stop-daemon.REAL /sbin/start-stop-daemon

New Video – HULU on the Zipit Z2

hunter — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 02:57:07 +0000

And not just HULU, anything that you can dynamically transcode and serve on the network, you can watch or listen to on the Z2. 30 rock on the Zipit Z2? Oh YES THANKS. Instructions after the jump.

Though this has been possible from the first image posted, I only today finally sat down and set it all up. Essentially, you are going to transcode audio or video on the fly to the Z2 using a windows or linux computer.

First, setup your transcoder machine. For the most part this is beyond the scope of this guide, but I'll give a windows example
For the windows users, I recommend TVersity. It's free to try for as long as you like, and they are really good to their customers
Setup your data sources, In TVersity add your HULU/youtube username (for your online video queues) and any audio/video folders you wish
Now setup the transcoder, for TVersity set the maximum video and image size to be 320x240. In the general settings, set your playback device to be mpeg1/2 device, and set the port for the web interface (and if you're really lazy, set your port to be 80)
On your trancoding machine, obtain the ip address (ipconfig (windows) / ifconfig(linux)
If you want to stream your files over the net, forward incoming connections to the ip/port combination above on your external router
Now, on the Z2 create a script with the following contents
#/bin/sh mplayer -vo fbdev -vf rotate=2 -bandwidth 100000 %1
This tells mplayer to rotate the framebuffer (who wants the overhead of X11 or flux...) 90 degrees ccw (non-flipped) and limit the bandwidth to 100k
Connect your zipit to your wireless network, and use dillo or links etc to browse to the ip address of your server
Browse to the audio or video file you wish to watch, and copy that shortcut (or output to file). You may want to just wget/grep for the shortcut if you are comfortable on the command line
Pass the shortcut (or paste it into a script, etc) into the script you created earlier.
Voila! Streaming Audio/Video etc on the Z2 in great quality! Bet you didn't think it'd do that eh? If you're feeling adventurous, you can set the link handler for dillo or fennec to open the script and be fully GUI